Saturday, December 14, 2013

He ain't dead, only caulking

I feel a little guilty about this, since you really shouldn't sneak up on a guy while he's working, but sometimes it's impossible to pass on an opportunity.

The last stop Thursday on a Hotel Charitone walk-through was the basement, flooded now with light because generous window wells once filled with concrete were reopened during restoration, new windows installed and the wells topped with beautifully functionally steel grills in steel frames flush with the sidewalk.

The look is wonderful, but the wells aren't especially convenient work spaces when it's necessary to give the windows a little attention.

Which is why this guy, who appears to be in repose in the top photo, was lying flat on his back in one of the wells with only his head visible through a window. At first sight, it was a little disconcerting.

Then you realized he was reaching for supplies he really couldn't see. Once supplied, he continued with the work at hand.

The basement originally housed a barber shop at its west end, accessible via both an exterior stair and a hotel entrance; a beauty shop; even a bar called the Elbow Room. There are no immediate plans for its use other than for storage and utilities.

About that danged blogger

1. Southern Iowan. Who can measure the importance of place? 2. Queer, cranky and getting older. 3. Vietnam veteran. 4. Certified skeptic: Secular humanist with a Lutheran and Unitarian Universalist past and Episcopalian leanings. My life, as does everyone else's, involves living contradictions with as much grace as possible.